Ray Hendon

Ultraportables, which include the newest incarnation of thin and light laptops, the Ultrabook, are thought by some to be a threat to tablet computers.  The instant-on capability of Ultrabooks are believed to be especially attractive to those who have been buying tablets because of this feature. 

It appears likely to me that Ultrabooks and other thin and light laptops will do well in the market place, especially when their prices fall a few hundred dollars.  But whether they will dampen any of the enthusiasm for tablets is another matter.  Personally I think both form factors satisfy separate needs for different users.

One feature of the new Ultrabooks that will help resolve the question is whether they will serve their owners as competent eReaders.  Surely there are some prospective buyers who would prefer to own only one device rather than two—but only if the one could do the work of two.  Can an Ultrabook do both heavy duty computing and convenient eReading?  Can one design satisfy both these needs?

Certainly a dedicated eReader or a tablet have some advantages over a laptop, even a thin and light one.  Reading electronic books, for example is probably done best by a device that closely emulates the look and feel of a book.  The popularity of the Kindle and Nook are thought to owe much of their success to their similarity to printed books.

How essential is the look and feel,  though, to those who read a lot.   This article takes a look at the possibility of using these new, thin and light computers as an eReader.

To put this question to a practical test, I loaded the top three eReading applications to an 11.6” screen Asus UX21 to see how they worked.  The applications chosen to test are:

Amazon’s Kindle App for PCs, Macs, iPad, iPhone and Android devices

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• Barnes and Noble’s Nook Application for PC, Mac, iPad, iPhone  and Android devices
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• Sony’s Reader Application for PC, Mac and Android devices

  

To give you a taste of the difference, I have taken screen shots of random pages from eBooks on the three applications I mentioned.

Beginning with Amazon, a screen shot of George Eliot’s Daniel Deronda, is displayed in the two column format for laptop viewing. The screen shot is taken of the Kindle application for PCs.

Screen of Kindle Reader in Two Column Format

The Kindle app is widely praised for its versatility of layout options, underlining, comments, bookmarks and especially its syncing abilities.  This app also has go-to options that ease navigation, and dictionary lookup for a highlighted word.  All these features work on Ultrabooks. 

Amazon also has a user friendly policy of allowing you to direct any book in your library to be sent to any device on your registered list of devices. Amazon is indifferent as to which device or how many you use for any their electronic titles.  It treats them all the same and syncs them in an effortless way. The moment I registered my latest laptop, the Asus ZenBook UX21, all books in my library were immediately available for reading.

The strongest features of Amazon is, in my view, the ease of use of its website.  It is easy to find books, send them to the device of your choice, and generally navigate their vast site.

Equally strong is the selection of books, magazines and newspapers. They claim over a million titles, but that includes some categories such as “Singles” that represent a new class of literature that is generally shorter than a book but longer than an article. 

The worst feature of Amazon is that they insist on using a proprietary format for their eBook files.  It has an AZW extension and works only on Kindle software or hardware.  Although all the free sites I use give the option of downloading their books in the AZW format, in practice it is not terribly inconvenient.  Amazon also can read PDF files, and they will convert your Word for Windows documents to a format that allows you to put them in you Kindle library.

The other downside to Amazon is that they use DRM (digital rights management) on everything, so there is no cutting or pasting using anything in the AZW format. 

The Nook eReader software also provides a good reader experience. The screen shot below is from one of their pre-DRM works. Don’t be fooled by the small typeface. My screen capture utility shrunk it because the Nook takes up more of the horizontal space of the computer screen than the Kindle reader, so it has to cut the size down to fit within the pasted space. In practice, the Nook screen is as readable as any other.

Screen shot from the Nook Reader using the dual pane format

All the formatting and user options are available for the Nook reader–font size, margins, highlighting, lookup, go-to. And the B&N syncing feature is excellent between devices, and they offer their reader software app for a wide range of devices.

As far as eReading goes, it is hard to find much to prefer of B&N over Amazon or vice versa.  Both are excellent and have almost identical features.

The same is true for selection of books. B&N’s inventory is huge, and they have a good selection of free public domain books—as good as or better than Amazon’s.

Nook uses the ePub format, as does Sony, although both will read many other formats as well.  They do not read Amazon’s proprietary AZW file format, however.

Something of an oddity: The Nook reader treats all ePub software as DRM protected, so they do not allow cutting or pasting of non-DRM books.  Even on the iPad, whose own iReader app allows cutting and pasting of non-DRM protected material the  Nook does not.

Sony’s reader app provides a good reading experience. The screen shot below is from an ePub file of a non-DRM version of Sherlock Holmes.

Screen of Sony Reader’s Dual Column Layout

As with the Nook, the Sony Reader software uses more of the landscape screen to display its materiel than the Kindle app, so my clipping software has to reduce it to fit the pasting space. But Sony gives one plenty of formatting options and page control.

Sony lags both Amazon and B&N with book selection and syncing ability.  Their books are generally priced high; they have few free books, and their selection doesn’t match its two larger competitors.

Sony makes its reader software available to fewer devices—no iPad, no iPhone, no BlackBerry, for example.  They have syncing available to the three types of devices they support, but I have not tried it personally.

I like the Sony reader app for its ability to read almost any kind of document regardless of format, except, of course, Kindle documents. I will always have their app installed on my computers in case a particular book is not available in the Kindle format.  And they allow cut and paste options for non-protected books.

I find all three of the reader software about equally enjoyable to use. The differences in layout and options are not terribly important. I find I use the Kindle app more than the others because I find more books on their site I like, and I like to sync the books among all my devices. Still, I maintain active use of the Nook and the Sony Readers.

Summary:

First, the reality of the size and convenience of specialized eReaders and tablets makes it clear that they have the advantage. It is not possible for an ultrabook, weighing in at 2.9 pounds, to be as convenient to use as a 7-inch tablet or even the pound and a half iPad.

However, it is also inconvenient to carry two devices if one will do. So, there will be occasions when a thin and light laptop could be a suitable substitute for a dedicated eReader or tablet. 

At bottom, all of these tested apps work well on an Ultrabook. And they would work just as well with the software from other vendors such as Kobo or Blio. If your eReading preferences include comic books, magazines or children’s books, then you might like a specialty reader designed for the formats unique to these publications.

While all the eReading apps work well on an Ultrabook, it still may not be your preferred way of reading electronic texts.  But they are completely usable as a primary or secondary eReader. The choice of one over another is more dependent on which site you prefer to use because of its particular strengths than to the characteristics of their eReades.

From my experience, I have given away my Kindle reader. I simply do not want to carry another device with me in my travels. Now that I have a 7-inch tablet, the Samsung Galaxy Tab, I use it as my eReader of choice because of its lightness and ease of holding in one hand. I use the iPad for e-reading infrequently, but there are occasions when it comes in handy. Its weight, though, makes it a second choice, especially for long reading times. 

I rarely use a PC or my ultraportable for reading, but if I do it will be on the ultraportable.  Its lightness and instant-on feature does make it a better choice than the older, heavier laptops, but it is not as convenient to carry as a tablet.

An ultraportable may not be your favorite way of reading electronic texts, but it serves as a completely satisfying vehicle for reading if you want to carry only one device with you or if an occasion arises when it is all you have to use.

Reports out the last few days point to Barnes and Noble looking at ways of selling some or all of their Nook line of eRedeaders.  The problem is an odd one.  By most measures the Nooks have been successful products.  They competed effectively with other eReading devices, and the Nook Color almost singlehandedly defined a new niche in the tablet category of computers.

The bottom line, however, is that the sales success has not been translated to B&N’s bottom line:  the large book chain has not found  a way to sell their fancy new devices at a profit.  Development costs are high, as are the costs of keeping the products up to date in a fast-paced technology industry. 

B&N is said to be looking at two options:  The first is to sell the brand to another firm that could afford to continue developing the Nooks and to promote them in American and international markets.  It is understood, apparently, that these products need further development and to be promoted more than they are now if they are to become profitable.

The second option would be to sell a large percentage of the products to another firm but keep  a minority interest.  This would allow B&N to reap some of the expected profits from the line as it reached critical mass.  And it would free them from the need to raise additional capital.

Lurking behind the issue is that B&N is not currently profitable.  Furthermore, if they sell or drop the line of eReaders, what they are left with is a dinosaur brick and mortar book chain that is steadily losing ground to the same digital markets that the Nook has helped define.

Some analysts feel the Nook is doomed and will eventually disappear.  The price pressure applied by Amazon is simply too much for each of their products, the e-Ink Reader that sells for $100, the Nook Color for $199 and the Nook Tablet for $249.  At these prices, there is no margin left for profit and not enough money coming in to continue their development efforts.

If there is to be a buyer it must obviously be one with deep pockets.  Microsoft and Google qualify as having deep pockets.  But do they have the compelling interest?  It is hard to see Microsoft blowing itself up even beyond their present size to take on such a different breed of cat.  It is not an area in which they have much of a proprietary interest.  They are not hardware manufactures at their core; neither are they book sellers, electronic or otherwise.

The case for Google is better.  They have an electronics bookstore, although it is not doing particularly well.  And they make the Android OS that runs many of the eReaders, both e-Ink and LCD types.  They would have better bargaining power with the publishers for the electronic titles they would sell.  Perhaps a partnership would be possible for them.

It also seems that Sony could be interested.  Their selection of electronic titles lags B&N and Amazon, so they would gain traction in an industry that is not in their wheelhouse.  They make eReader hardware now, so there would be some duplication in picking up the Nook line.  However, Sony could use the Color Nooks to enhance their offerings in the 7-inch segment of the tablet market.  Furthermore, Integrating these two sides of the Pacific might me more than Sony could do given their current state of struggle in the computer market.  This makes them a longshot, in my view.

12/21/2011:  Fire Fixes Flaws

From David Pogue: “Animations are sluggish and jerky — even the page turns that you’d think would be the pride of the Kindle team. Taps sometimes don’t register. There are no progress or ‘wait’ indicators, so you frequently don’t know if the machine has even registered your touch commands. The momentum of the animations hasn’t been calculated right, so the whole thing feels ornery.”

+A software update, sent out over the air on Tuesday, fixes these balky characteristics.  According to reviews, the carousel stops spinning on a dime; it takes only one tap to open an application, and one tap opens something much faster than before. and page turns are faster and smoother.

There was one enhancement, too.  The user can control which apps are in the home carousel.

A good fix for the Fire that makes a significant difference in user satisfaction.

12/19/2011:  Lenovo Has Quad-core 10.1-inch Tablet in The Oven

A report from DigiTimes, a newspaper based in Taiwan that keeps a close eye on electronics manufacturers in that island nation, says that Lenovo has a quad-core tablet ready to begin production in January.   It will be called the K2, which will be an update of the existing K1.  The new device will feature an  NVIDIA Tegra 3 quad-core processor, up to 2GB of RAM, and Google Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich operating system.

12/17/2011:  7-inch iPad Coming in Late 2012?

DigiTimes, an infamous reporter of random rumors strikes again with a report that Apple is buying oodles of 7.85-inch displays from LG and Aupotronics.  Presumably these purchases are intended for use by the Cupertino firm, and it probably isn’t for a new laptop.  More likely it would be for the often speculated 7-inch tablet, a sort of mini-iPad. 

The rumor would put delivery close to the end of 2012.  DigiTimes has been right in some of their reporting, given the close relationship they have with the Taiwan firms that actually manufacture many of the world’s laptops.  But, they have also been wrong, so there is no way of knowing yet.

RIM’s BlackBerry Playbook  sold about 850,000 units for the three quarters since its introduction.  %00,000 weere sold in its first quarter, 200,000 the next and now, 150,000 in the last quarter that ended November 26th.  RIM has been working overtime trying to get sales going on their tablet.  They have sent out multiple OS fixes, and they promise a much improved model in February.  But, the main emphasis for boosting their sales has been to lower the price to $200.  this has helped, and it is rumored that after Christmas selling season is over they will keep the $200 price point as permanent.

This will make it hard for other 7-inch tablets to get more than $200, with the Kindle Fire selling at that price, too.  This is good news for those who are considering a 7-inch model to supplement their digital experiences.

12/12/2011: Kindle Fire to Get Software Update

Amazon will push an update to Kindle Fire owners before the end of the year, according to a report in the New York Times.  The new software will offer better performance, improvements in multitouch navigation, and the ability to edit the list of recently used items that show up on the home screen.

All of the enhancements are in response to consumer complaints that have been documented in reviews posted by the early adopters of the new 7-inch tablet.  Nearly 33% of early buyers have given the Fire three star or less ratings.  This compared with only 11% of the first Kindle buyers some years ago.

12/08/2011:  The Nook Tablet Ships a Million

It is clear now that the 7-inch segment of the tablet market will never be the same since Amazon and Barnes and Noble brought out their 7-inchers at prices that translate to roughly half the prevailing prices at the time.

Amazon’s success with the Kindle Fire has been widely publicized, and now Barnes and Noble is said to have shipped a million units of their Nook Tablet since its mid-November debut.

Neither the Fire nor the Nook Tablet are as full featured as their competition from Samsung or HTC, to name a couple, but the pricing at that end of the market will never again support a $400 price, much less the $500 price point at which they were initially offered.

An example is offered by RIM’s BlackBerry Playbook.  Even at the deeply discounted price of $199, they are expected to have sold only about 150,000 units for the entire quarter.  Admittedly the $199 price point was not in effect during the entire quarter, but with Amazon selling four to five million since mid November and Barnes and Noble at least taking shipments on a million units, this can spell only disaster for the PlayBook.  I wonder if it can be fixed.

The sales of Samsung 7-inch tabs and HTC are not yet known, but it cannot be expected to be much.  Altough HTC has reduced the price on their 7-incher to $199, I wonder how much they can sell.  The original Galaxy Tab is now selling for $200 with a 3G contract.  It is hard to see that the newer models of the same size will sell much at their $400 price points.

12/01/2011: Electronic Reading Continues it Rapid Growth

Electronic reading continues to grow at a fast pace as it continues to grab a larger slice of the book sales pie. Amazon reported today that they now offer over 900,000 eBooks in English and other languages, all offered for sale through their website.

Following this announcement, Juniper Research, a firm that follows the industry, released a report which foresees sales of electronic books to reach almost $10 billion by 2016. Sales for this year are estimated to be about $3.2 billion.

Juniper attributes the rise to the growing inventory of eBooks and in the number of eReading devices on the market. They also say that the spread of eReading to smartphones, tablets and other mobile devices is expected to contribute to the growth. The research firm expects that tablets alone may account for as much as 30 percent of eBook downloads by 2016.

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Tablets, from the iPad at the high end to the Kindle Fire and Nook Tablet at the low , have dominated the press coverage and public attention this year.  Now with both new low-end devices in the public’s hands, and hands-on reviews coming in hourly, much of the mystery about them has vanished.  The excitement, it appears, has faded with the exposure.  These new devices will eventually dominate electronic reading, but many readers still prefer the old-fashion e-Ink displays, so they will probably be around for some time to come.

The new crop of e-Ink readers from the three major suppliers:  Amazon, Nook and Sony, all have great displays, faster page turns, touch interfaces (with the exception of the low-end Kindle) and are light to hold.   It is the best of times if you want to experience the joys of having a thousand-book library in your back pocket, ready in an instant, that can be held and read for hours at a time without eye strain.  And as the product has improved, prices have fallen from $400 when they first appears to as low as $80 now.

To whom do you turn for your e-Ink reader?  Sony, Kindle, Nook?  These are the best of the best, and given that the best in quality and support also have such low prices, it leaves, in my opinion, no room for lower quality products.

Before beginning my reviews and comparisons, let me get my prejudices out of the way.  I have owned a Kindle 2, which I recently gave away, and I owned a Nook for a few weeks.  I liked both products, and each has good reason to support it as the one to own.  With the Sony product, it also looks good, but I have had only a brief exposure to it.   I gave away my Kindle not because it is not a great eReader.  I found myself using it less and less and using the 7-inch tablet from Samsung as my primary eReader. 

From the outset, I don’t think it makes much difference which brand you choose.  All of them will give you a good user experience, and you will probably find yourself reading more than you ever had before.  All are high quality products in both design and build-quality. 

Kindles

Kindle now has three models with variations of each.  The low-end is anchored by the Kindle at $79.  It has no touch and no keyboard, but it does have WiFi so you can download books directly from Amazon’s vast library.  The screen is about the same as the other models, but to turn a page you must use a five-way button at the bottom of the device.

It weighs less than 6 ounces, is easy to hold and the screen looks great. Reviews of the Kindle are uniformly good.

"

The new Kindle is the best e-reader $100 (or less!) can buy." - Engadget

… if what you want is pure e-reading pleasure for the lowest price around, this is a big, definite winner." – GigaOm

At $79 the user must endure ads displayed when the reader is not in use.  This can be avoided for an extra $30.  It, and all other Kindle models allow you to borrow books from your local library if your library offers the service.  If your local one does not, find one on line in another location and open an account with them.

Next up the line is the Kindle touch.

The Kindle came late to the touch party, but their implementation of this technology is first rate.  Multi-touch control is enabled, so the old form of scrolling through titles is gone.  At $99 with ad support and $139 without, it is, in my view, the sweet spot unless you want 3G ability in addition to WiFi.

This model also has a “read to me” feature that may be handy for those who like it.  It can also read audio books.

The same model with 3G is for sale at $149 with ad support or $189 without.  this feature will allow you to download books without being tethered to WiFi.  The 3G connection is free—no other reader has this feature.

The last model offered is the Kindle Keyboard.  It does not have a touch screen but includes the older design physical keyboard.  This is handy for tasks that require alpha-numeric input.  Personally, I would prefer the touch screen, but that is a personal preference.  Notice

the toggle switch at the bottom left of the picture.  That is how you turn pages.

With ad support this old model it is priced at $139 and $189 without.  The same pricing is available for their 3G version that has 3G and WiFi. 

The Kindle line is by far the most extensive in the industry.  Both Barnes and Noble and Sony now sell only one model of e-Ink screen readers.  But Amazon sees something in the market that allows it to expand its offers to such a wide array of choices.

The reviews of all these models have been uniformly good.  The screens are readable, employing the new Pearl technology and an infrared touch scheme that doesn’t dull the screen like the older versions of touch-control did.

Amazon has nothing on Sony or Nook on this issue, however.  Both its competitors employ the same set of technologies.

The last word I will leave to David Pogue, technology editor of the New York Times.  He concludes his review of the Kindle line: “Is your primary interest in an e-book reader, well, reading? Then Amazon’s refined, dirt-cheap Kindle and Kindle Touch are no-brainers.”

But read the reviews on the Nook and Sony devices, too.  You may find something there that is appealing.

Nook

The Nook Simple Touch is now priced at $99 without a power adapter. Add another $10 to get a functional price. 

The Nook has always had a good looking design.  The screen is great for an e-Ink display.  The page turns are fast, font selection is good.  There is nothing not to like about their eReader.

Barnes and Noble also have a wide selection of books to choose from, including many that are free.  I have had a B&N account for several years, and I find their selection to be excellent.  They have some free books that Amazon doesn’t have, which is a plus.  And their sync option between different reading devices is quite good.  It operates on a different principle than Amazon’s Whispersync, but it works well.

B&N has also done a fine job of making their eReading software available on a wide range of devices.  I use the Nook reader on my iPhone, iPad, PC and laptops.  They also have a BlackBerry version.

Connection with the Nook is through WiFi or side-loading from your computer. No 3G option is available. Barnes and Noble also tout that you can get in-store support from their huge chain of book stores.

You can also borrow books from your local library on the Nook. All in all, it is a fine machine that few would have complaints of, and the price is competitive.

the Nook uses the ePub  as their default format, but it will also read PDF and some other formats.  It can handle Digital Right Management or not, so it is quite  flexible. 

Reviews on the Nook are uniformly good. It is a high quality machine with a good backup in terms of support.

Sony Reader WiFi

Sony has trimmed their line of eReaders down to one. The Reader WiFi features an excellent touch screen with infrared technology and the Pearl e-Ink display.  As usual the build-quality is good and their range of file formats supported is extensive.

The Reader WiFi is priced, not surprisingly, at about $50 higher than Amazon’s or Barnes and Noble’s comparable models.  At $149.99 it has specs similar to Amazon’s and Barnes and Noble’s $99 machines.

They have an offer to give $50 off on a trade-in for any other eReader, so that would bring their price in line, however.

Nevertheless, Sony has not kept us with its competitors in terms of wider support.  Their book store is anemic when compared with the others, but their wide range of format acceptance leaves the owner with many options for third-party books.  They have their reader software on PCs and Macs, but not much else.  And they do not offer any kind of syncing of reading bookmarks between devices.

Sonk kept their older designs longer than any of their competitors, and did not offer WiFi until recently.  While their build-quality can be counted on, one does not have the wide range of support for other products and amenities that its two competitors offer.

For a thorough review from Engadget, Click Here.  The reviewer concludes his statement:

“There’s a lot to like about this new guy. The WiFi Reader has a lot of compelling functionality, including dual-touch pinch to zoom, handwritten note taking, audio playback and built-in access to public library and Google Books content. At $149.99, it’s also quite reasonably priced for a Sony reader, down $30 from the Sony Reader Pocket Edition (which, it’s worth noting, failed to include WiFi). That number still marks a premium over the $79 starting price for the new ad-supported Kindle and the $99 ad-supported Touch, and with that in mind, don’t expect Sony to overtake Amazon on these shores any time soon.

Reacting to the latest developments in the eReader market, Sony has replaced all three of its old line Readers with a single Reader Wi-Fi.  It retails on the Sony website for $149.99 and is available in black, white or red.

The video below is by The eBook Reader.

The reviews of the Reader Wi-Fi are generally good.  The new reader is up to par with its competitors from Amazon, Barnes and Noble and Kobo, although it is about $50 higher—common for Sony which always stays near or above the high end for pricing.

The new reader features an infrared touch screen that goes a little beyond some of its competition by enabling pinch and zoom functionality.  It supports 2 GB of internal memory and has a micro SD card slot for expanded memory.

The screen resolution is 600 X 800 and supports 16 grayscale—standard fare on today’s EInk screens using the Pearl technology.

A good new addition is the ability to write on the screen.  One can print characters, circle or add artwork to the screen—handy for making notes on what you are reading.  The PRS-T1 also supports a black and white browser, which is as good as an EInk screen can be for browsing, and a special menu for accessing your local library for a free borrowing capability of electronic editions of books.

Sony’s new device also plays MP3 files, and one can listen to your music library while reading.

The size is typical of Sony—long and narrow.  Its overall size is 6.9” and it weighs in at a light six ounces.

For a full written review, check out the Engadget site Click here for the Engadget Review.

With the addition of Wi-Fi Sony has brought its new reader up to par with its competition for black and white eReading.  For those who prefer the internally illuminated screen for their eReading, the Sony Table S is an excellent choice.

There seems to be a misunderstanding about eReading on the various operating systems that power many of the new tablets coming to market this year.  Some fear that the larger screens and new operating systems will not be able to read electronic texts of the major vendors.

Each of the major new tablets is reviewed below for its ability to read Kindle, Nook and Sony electronic formats.

Android Tablets

There are four Android tablets that are either out now or will be soon.

· The Motorola Xoom is on sale now at Best Buy and at Verizon stores.

· The LG G-Slate is expected this month.

· Galaxy Tab 10.1 doesn’t have a date set, yet.

· Acer has its Iconia Tab A500 set for a date sometime in April.

All are slated to run Android 3.0, the Honeycomb version, and the first Android system made for large screen formats. The new version of Android is a source of much of this confusion. Earlier versions of Android were written for cell phones with their 3 and 4-inch screens. It appears that some believe that the new software will not work with the older eReader applications that were written with small screens in mind. The pictures below show the Kindle apps that Amazons offers its customers.

Note that the second icon from the left, the Kindle for Android, is depicted as a smartphone. This is probably the origin of some of the confusion. Android versions from the first through version 2.2.1 were written for this size screen. However, the new Android 3,0 scales these apps to larger screens with good results.  The problem of clunky graphics that plagued the iPad for apps that were brought over from the iPhone, are largely avoided by Android. (Update 4/23–Amazon announced a few days ago that they were re-writing their Kindle App for Adroid 3.0.  So any problems with the larger screens will be addressed with the new release. RH)

The Galaxy Tab 7 uses the older version Android eReading apps, and the Kindle eReader works well on it. The same is true for the new Honeycomb versions of tablets. I checked Motorola’s Xoom yesterday and the Kindle app scales well on the larger 10.1-inch screen. I can say the same for an independent eReading app from Aldiko. The reading page looks fine on both apps and all the font and brightness controls available on the small-screens  work as they are supposed to.

The only drawback to the scaling is that when the Xoom is turned horizontally, neither the Kindle app not the Aldiko switches to a dual-pane display—this feature isn’t available to the small-screen versions of eithr reader.  I suspect that Amazon will make this adjustment quickly, however. They made it for the iPad within the first month it it going one sale.

I mention this because on wide screens a dual- pane division is helpful to the reader. Long lines are hard to follow, and a dual pane window solves the problem nicely.

The absence of a dual-pane switch tells me that Amazon and Barnes and Noble will most likely rewrite their reader software for the larger Android screen.

The picture below is of devices for Nook eReaders.

They match up well with Amazon with the exception of a Windows Phone 7 app, but that will probably have one soon. The scalable properties of the Nook are the same as for Amazon and Aldiko, so Nook owners need have no fear of buying an Android tablet.

Other Operating Systems: HP’s WebOS and BlackBerry’s QNX

Kobo is the only eReader app available for the Palm/HP WebOS. The Palm Pre is shown on the far right in the picture below.

The Pre runs the Palm OS that HP now owns.  HP has enhanced the OS and blown it up for the larger tablet screens. It isn’t known how the older apps will scale to the new 10.1-inch dimensions of the HP Touch Pad’s. But I cannot imagine HP not taking care of this issue before releasing their new tablet, scheduled sometime in the summer of this year.

I feel confident that HP’s new WebOS will have a full complement of reader apps when the time comes for them to go on sale. HP has too much credibility in the industry not to be able to convince Amazon and others to build reader apps for its tablet and smartphones.

RIM’s BlackBerry Playbook has several options of bringing their existing eReaders to the new seven-inch platform. First, with their huge installed base of BlackBerry smartphones, no book seller is going to be caught without a new app ready for it the day it is introduced. (Rumor has it that April 10^th will be the day).

RIM has also said that the Playbook will be able to run legacy apps from its earlier OS days, so existing apps from Kindle, Nook, and Kobo, for example, would be able to run on the new OS. There is also the real possibility that the new OS of BlackBerry will be able to run Android apps. Company executives have dropped the hint that they are considering making it compatible with Android —their hardware inside the tablet is certainly capable of being programmed to do it, and I would not be surprised to see it happen.  (Update 4/23–the only eReading app ready on the day of its release was Kobo.  I noticed the Kobo icon on the home screen when I checked the Playbook out at my local Best Buy store.  Kobo will read ePub files, so early adopters of the Playbook will have plenty of reading material available from day one.  RH)

Windows Tablets

On the few tablets that run Windows, all of the major booksellers already have software for it.  If it runs on your PC, it will run on a tablet.

This is not true for Windows Phone 7, however.  The eReader apps will have to be re-written, but that is already underway. Kindle had their app pre-installed on Windows Phone 7 smartphones the day they were introduced. Also, there are no expectations that this new operating system will be ready for a tablet until sometime in 2012.

Whether they will be as easily scalable as Android, though, we cannot know for certain until Microsoft steps forward with more details.

Overall it looks good for those who enjoy reading on electronic devices. The options are growing daily, and many of the new tablets have features that exceed what we have come to expect from laptops and the iPad. With the syncing ability of the major vendors of electronic titles, it is easy to switch devices without losing your place and without having to buy new copies.

As more magazines and newspapers become available in an electronic format, we can expect more and more time spent reading our favorite material whenever and wherever we happen to be. This is the liberating power of the new technology.

Ray Hendon

For those who recently acquired an eReader one of your first urges is to load it up with new books. Understandably, this urge is strong and eBooks stores are happy to help.

However. before jumping into paying for current titles, be aware of the availability of tens of thousands of books that are absolutely free of costs–all of them available for virtually any device, regardless of the brand. Even better, many if not most of the free titles are among the best books ever written.

In the United States, for example, books published in 1922 and prior years are no longer protected by copy-write restrictions and are free of fees to publishers. Before electronic reading began its growth stage, many publishers would print these old titles and sell them at significantly reduced prices in paperback format.   T.S. Eliot, William Faulkner, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Herman Melville, Mark Twain, Edgar Allan Poe and Walt Whitman are a few who come under this rule.

In Europe it is about the same, so we have available, free of charge, the high quality novels, poetry and essays of some the world’s greatest writers. Dickens, Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Wordsworth, Blake, Pope, Flaubert, and thousands of others are available.

Printed copies of these titles are still being sold, but a major new wrinkle in publishing came along when the Gutenberg Project was begun. The Gutenberg Project takes as its mission in life to scan the huge library of copy-write-free books into a digital format and then give them away to anyone who asks. The internet has made this dream a reality, and the development of compressed formats of electronic titles made it easy and fast to download.  Regardless of your device, you can download a huge volumes of works to a PC, Mac or proprietary electronic reading device—Kindles, Sony Readers and Nooks, e.g.

Now there are hundreds of sites that either feature these free classic titles or at least carry many of them along with their regular for-sale inventory. Below you will find some of my favorite free sites.  Don’t forget, most of them have a variety of formats available. If you have a Kindle, you simply ask for the Kindle format. For most other eReaders, ePub and PDF formats are also available.

Gutenberg: Click Here. : The original site has a great selection of about 33,000 titles. Their site is not as slick in layout and user-friendliness as others, but once accustomed to its clunky interface, it is worth the effort. The main thing here to lookout for is that their search engine is not sophisticated in guessing what you are looking for. Spelling and precise names and titles are required to bring up a hit. Many of their titles are also available as audio books, wonderful for blind readers and others who prefer being read to.

Manybooks: Manybooks.net is much more civilized in its web page layout, and it boasts over 35,000 titles, all free. Many of the titles will be the same as Gutenberg, of course, but they have many of their own. The file formats available for download are many—all the usual suspects plus many you may have never heard of. This is almost always my first choice when looking for a classical title. Their search engine is also unimaginative, so be precise with titles and authors, or use their browsing by category system or browse alphabetically by author.

Inkmesh: Inkmesh has no inventory of its own, but will search sites for you to see if your title of choice is available and if so, where. It is also handy for fee-type titles if you want to compare prices. They also have classifications that you can browse by: adventure, romance, business, etc. It is a handy site to have available.

Amazon Free Books: Amazon has a rich library for free books, but they are not easily found. This link will get you directly to their free book section, but expect to have to fiddle with it some. Also, be careful and observant on their title searches. They will often bring up a range of options for any title, and many of the titles have fee versions as well as free. You may end up paying 99₵ or more for a title that may also be free if you look further down the list.

Barnes and Noble Free Books:  Everything I said about Amazon is true for Barnes and Noble. They have a good selection of free books, but the only file format available is ePub.

Kobo:Kobo has the ePub format, so Kindle users need not try. But Kobo has many free books. Finding them, though, is not easy. Usually, searching by a classic title will bring up paid and free versions of the title.

There are other sites, but this list should last for the first few thousand titles. Also, if you have an iPhone or Android smartphone, all the reader apps for Kindle, Barnes and Noble, and Kobo (Borders) are available. This way, you can download to your Nook, for example, and have the same library available on the iPhone or Droid. This is handy for short waits that allow you to read your current selection for a few minutes of productive fun.

Ray Hendon

11/20/2010

The month of November has been a watershed for this website.  For the period from November 14th through the 26th, the number of inquiries per day jumped about 600%.  And then, on November 24th, the drop off was dramatic.  Black Friday marked the end of the surge.

During this time of greatly expanded inquiries, I noticed that certain articles were receiving a huge proportion of the hits, and now that it is over, I have gone back to my data and painstakingly compiled exactly which ones got how many requests.

The results for the top 14 of the eReaders are posted in the table below:

*Face-off is for a single article posted that compared the iPad, the Sony Reader series, Kindle and the Nook.

A bar chart of the percentages is shown below.

I tracked six additional names, but none of them got to the one percent level.  Also, the iPad got relatively few hits, but this is a site for eReaders, so those looking for information were, I assume, looking at the iPad as an eReader and not as a full functioning tablet computer.

A number of things stand out in the data.  First, color rules.  I didn’t count the request under the generic heading of “Color eReader,” but if I had, this generic label would have placed rather high in the ranking.

Secondly, the numbers of requests for Kindle information is not good news for Amazon.  From a third to half of the Kindle requests were for an article I did on the possibility of a color Kindle in the near future, and which I answered in the negative.  Thus a large percentages of the Kindle requests resulted in an answer that would possibly point the interested party away from Kindle.

If my conclusion that color rules is correct, then that explains part of the reason Sony, the third largest supplier of eReading devices, places so poorly in the rankings.  It also expalins why the Nook (without color) didn’t even make the top ten.  I expect the price of it and the Kindle to fall in the not too distant future, if this shift to color is as pronounced as it appears.

A third conclusion is that the seven inch tablet is a strong product, at least for those looking.  The Nook Color, Velocity Cruz, View Sonic, Galaxy Tab and RIM Playbook are all seven inch screens, and all with color and fast refresh rates.  If they dominate in sales the way they dominated the requests my site received, seven inches is a winning number.

The last thing that stands out in the numbers I collected is that there is a great deal of price elasticity for tablets.  This means that a small price drop will bring in more revenue to the seller through a large increase in sales.  There is some pent-up demand for colorful surfing and eReading from a segment of the population that can’t pony up the $500 or more for an iPad or Galaxy Tab.  A manufacturer that can bring a good quality tablet to the market under the $500 price mark will likely be rewarded by large sales.

For these reasons, it looks to me that Barnes and Noble has won this Christams from Amazon.  Its Nook Color has hit a sweet spot among those looking for eReaders with color and surfing ability.  My guess is the the Nook Color is going to be under many Christmas trees soon.

All four major of the major retailers of electronic books provide free software for reading their titles on mobile devices.  These applications extend the ability to read well beyond the proprietary reader hardware they sell, and give their owners a flexibility in what, when and where they read that was unimaginable a few years ago.

I will describe and review the mobile offerings for all four:  Amazon’s Kindle Reader, Barnes and Noble’s Nook, Sony’s Reader and Borders’ Kobo.  There are also other mobile and desktop readers, but for this article, the focus is on the main players.

Amazon’s Kindle

Amazon leads the field by providing mobile software for six mobile devices now, with an additional one for Windows Phone 7 promised “soon.”  Their list of supported devices:

Windows PCs

Macintosh Computers

iPhone

Android Phone

BlackBerry

iPad

Windows Phone 7 –  soon. 

An eighth device, the Galaxy Tab is also supported, but the software comes installed.

Barnes and Noble’s Nook

B&N has largely kept pace with Amazon in making their reader software available of on mobile and fixed devices.  There are currently six supported :

Windows PCs

Macintosh Computers

iPhone

iPad

Blackberry

Android Phones

Sony Reader Editions

Sony lags the other eReader sellers.  They currently support two devices, with two more promised by December.

Windows PCs

Macintosh Computers (desktops, laptops)

  Promised in December:

    iPhone

    Android Phones

Borders’ Kobo

Borders has done a good job in keeping pace with its major rivals.  It partnered with Kobo and now has its software readers available for the same devices and B&N:

PC

Macintosh

iPhone

Blackberry

Android.

I have installed, subscribed and use all of the above apps except for Mac and iPhone, and while they all do the same thing, more or less, there are differences, especially on PCs and Macs.  On mobile devices, however, there is little to separate them, since the real estate on phones is so limited.  I can’t tell the difference in any of them while reading on my Android phone

The story is a little different on PCs and Macs, but even here, there isn’t a great deal of difference.  They are all competent, and they all make it as easy as possible to get new and existing purchases into your reading library.

As for which one is preferred, the obvious first choice is to get the app that matches your dedicated reading device, if you have one.  I bought a Kindle early this year, so I got their app for my desktop, laptop and netbook. When I bought an iPad the Kindle app was my first download.  I bought a Droid at about the same time, and the first app for it was from Kobo, so I began with it and added Kindle a couple of weeks later when it was released.

If you are looking for the “best” app, I cannot name it.  The look and feel is different even within the same app on different devices.  On my Windows machines, I actually prefer reading with the Sony app.  It reads just about every format available (except Kindle, of course) and its navigation and font control are handy—not elaborate, but enough to give me control I want. I do not use my PCs much for reading, though, especially since the Kindle and iPad came along.

Most of the apps are good on the iPad, but I generally prefer the Kindle, especially now that they offer two-column reading in the landscape mode.  The Nook reader is excellent on the iPad, too.  Kobo does not do two-up columns in landscape, and it is slow to load and a tad unreliable for some titles, so I almost never use it on my iPad.  But, on my Droid, Kobo is a good as any.

The last thing to consider is the book selection, and here the winners are Amazon and Barnes and Noble.  Both have a great selection of free and not-free books. Both are easy to buy and download; their syncing is good.

One last point about book availability.  Most of my electronic reading is of the classics, although I buy a stray new title ever now and then.  As for the classics, all are free at Gutenberg or Manybooks.net, and all are downloadable in virtually any format your want. 

Amazon and B&N also have a good selection of free titles.  Sony does not, and Borders is somewhere in between—it has some, but not as many as the two leaders.

Whichever reader you chose, it is wonderful to have your entire library with you wherever you may be.  I do not always carry my iPad or Kindle, but I do always carry my Droid, so it is handy to be able to read a few minutes while waiting on an appointment or other occasion when I have a few minutes to spare.

All are free to try, so don’t be bashful in trying them out.

There have been comparisons of iPad vs Kindle vs. Sony vs. Nook before.  The reviews , however, have been dated by the recent introductions of the newer Kindle 3, and of the new Sony line of its Reader Editions.  The Nook has seen no major changes, but it has had some critical software updates that stabilized and otherwise enhanced the Nook.

Cnet has a new head-to-head review of all the latest models of these devices, and they offer a generally accurate and balanced appraisal of each brand.  They also offer a list of questions that, in my view, is helpful in narrowing the choices between this disparate group of gadgets.  Click here for the full review.

There is a legitimate argument that the iPad should not be compared with a dedicated eReader, since the iPad is a completely different device.  It is more of a full-featured computer than the stand-alone readers.  Nevertheless, many iPad owners use it to read electronic editions of books and magazines, so it deserves a place at the table for that reason.

For the same reasons, the Galaxy Tab is also mentioned as a viable alternative for eReading.

There is one error of omission in their assessment.  Item # 6 implies that many of the free downloads of eBooks are not available to the Kindle because it does not read the ePub format.  My experience in downloading free eBooks is that the sites I use most, Gutenberg and Manybooks.net, both offer downloads in multiple formats, and both include Kindles’ proprietary format as an option for the download.

That said, I supplement my Kindle library with some ePub downloads, because the iPad reads them, and the software version of the Sony and Nook readers do so as well. 

I find the Sony  PC reader software to be exceptionally robust in reading just about everything on the market.  I like it better than any other eReading software when reading on my PC.   I do not have a Sony Reader, however, although I think well of their hardware offerings.

If you are contemplating buying an eReading device, I recommend the article at Cnet as a good starting point.